VI 



NOCTURNAL FEEDING OF GAME-FISH 



Very numerous are the devices seen in the tackle 

 shops to capture fish at night, most of them being 

 a sort of luminous paint on spoons or plugs. Suc- 

 cessful or not, the fact remains that at certain 

 times during the season we know almost all 

 game-fish feed actively throughout the night as 

 well as by day. This habit is primarily due to the 

 fact that nearly all bottom creatures are bur- 

 rowers in the sand or mud, coming out of their 

 hiding-places only at night when the chance of 

 being captured by larger fish is less sure than it 

 is by daylight. Crawfish, lampers, and hellgram- 

 mites are all nocturnal creatures, because the 

 food they eat is more abundant during the night. 



73 



